


Forest of Dreams

by malhagie



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Burn, background bluesy - Freeform, magician and dreamer
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-03
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:42:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23455729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malhagie/pseuds/malhagie
Summary: After a bad night at his parents house Adam wanders into the surrounding forest. He discovers a secret both about another and himself.He struggles to preserve his sanity and unravel the secrets of the forest all while someone in the shadows moves against him."Adam walked down the lane to his parents’ shack. It was a peaceful night filled with the singing of crickets. He was exhausted after a long day of work and longed for the reprieve of sleep.He neared the end of the lane and saw that a candle still burned inside the shack. It was like being dunked in cold water. His father had stayed up waiting for him to return home."
Relationships: Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish
Kudos: 15





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to skip the violence just skip the first scene, scroll down past the first ***.  
> That's all the violence there is.

Adam walked down the lane to his parents’ shack. It was a peaceful night filled with the singing of crickets. He was exhausted after a long day of work and longed for the reprieve of sleep.

He neared the end of the lane and saw that a candle still burned inside the shack. It was like being dunked in cold water. His father had stayed up waiting for him to return home.

Adam did not pause. There would be no avoiding the inevitable. There would be no limping off. He would not grovel; he would not beg. He would go inside. He would face his father.

On silent feet he climbed the small porch. It creaked generously under his weight. With dread building in his stomach he cautiously opened the door. His hope shattered. His father sat at the kitchen table. He hulked menacingly in the low light. The scent of alcohol filled the small room.

“You’re home late,” Robert said in a detached manner, as if it was a simple observation and not an object of his rage.

“I’m so sorry sir. Boyd’s horse died so he couldn’t give me a ride home.”  
Robert muttered something under his breath that Adam was not able to understand. Adam hovered unsure of how to proceed. When Robert made no move after a few awkward moments of silence Adam began to move towards his small cot in the corner of the shack.

“Excuses!” Robert suddenly roared, slamming his palm on the table.

"Where's the money Adam? The money you owe me?" Robert stood with a yell, his chair clattering behind him.

“Money? Sir, I don’t understand,” Adam felt like a small child, powerless and small in the face of his father’s rage.

“The money!” Robert screamed. He stomped across the room, lifted Adam’s thin mattress, and flung it across the room revealing Adam’s modest stash of cash hidden underneath.

Fear fell like a stone in Adam’s stomach. All that he had been working so tirelessly for was being ripped away from him.

“You stupid boy!”

Each step Robert took closer to Adam was the crack of thunder. Adam stood stock still like a frightened deer. 

He grabbed Adam by his shirt nearly lifting him off the ground. 

"How dare you hide money from me!"

His open hand struck Adam’s face with the swift violence of lightning.

Adam reeled from the blow, but his father held his ragged shirt, not letting him go.

"You good for nothing son of a bitch!" Adam was struck again, harder this time. He collapsed onto the floor.

"Get up." Robert grumbled.

Adam grabbed the door frame and began to haul himself to his feet. It was always better to look this in the eye and get it over with.

Before he got anywhere Robert kicked him in the side of the head. It felt like a hammer on his skull. Adam fell once more. The world swam around him and the sound rang loud in his ear. He struggled to stand to face his attacker, but it was no use. A second kick to the ribs propelled him onto the porch.

The door slammed. The latch fell. The candle was snuffed. Adam was locked out. 

He lay on the porch, dazed. He could feel warm blood from his ear trickling down his face. Slowly his eyes adjusted to the moonlight and the world began to regain focus.

With a Herculean effort Adam rose to his feet. 

He had nothing. He was nothing. 

Just a beaten and broken boy. Small and insignificant. Not a penny to his name. Nothing more than a punching bag to his father.

Barely human.

Adam turned to the sky. The stars twinkled overhead. He had worked so long and so hard for that meager amount of money. All his hopes were dashed.

Adam stood. He began walking. He didn't know where he was going but away. Away. Far far away.

***

The shadows were growing long and it was getting dark as the moon neared the horizon. Adam would miss its light once it was gone, but it meant that morning would be coming soon.

He had been walking through the forest for ages. He does not remember stepping off the road and entering the forest. Time was dissolving. It was an eternity that he had been walking.

The forest looked the same everywhere in the dark. Dark trees loomed, quiet giants in the darkness. It was silent except for the soft rustle of the wind through the leaves.

Adam continued to walk. The one thing he was sure of is that he would not stop.  
The branches above him creaked.

He spotted a figure through the trees. Adam froze in place, watching. The man stood in a clearing, illuminated by the moonlight. He couldn’t see Adam in the dark shadows of the trees.

The man had intense features, sharp cheekbones and a hairless head. He was hunched over, a shovel in hand. The hole he was digging is the size of a grave. Behind him a shapeless mass on the ground resolved itself into a body. 

The body shared the same face as man. 

A new panic rose in Adam. Slowly he began to back away.

A branch snapped under Adam’s foot. The man looked up and his intense gaze fell upon Adam.

Adam turned and ran. He didn’t think he just ran. The trees rushed past and exhaustion pushed down on him. He fights through it, the fear propelled him. He must escape. He must not die. He must live.

He ran and ran and ran until his lungs were bursting and his legs were aching and his feet were bruised. The moon had set and under the trees the darkness was all consuming. Adam felt dizzy and weak but he pushed on. The darkness grew closer.

He tripped and fell. A branch scraped open his leg, pain flared.

Adam was on the ground. The darkness was all consuming. Sleep was calling for him. The trees were whispering sweet nothings into his ears, lullabies singing him gently to sleep. Exhaustion overwhelmed him.

***

Adam came to with a pounding pain in his head. He slowly regained sensation in his body to find it filled with aches and pains.

A soft sensation distracted him from the many pains he felt. Slowly he opened his eyes. Dark eyes looked into his. They were in a pale face surrounded by a cloud of white curling hair. A soft caring smile and pleasant eyes.

“It’s alright child,” the woman said with a soft voice.

She gently stroked his face, “You will be safe now.”

Adam’s head rested on her thighs. He basks in the glow of the soft moment and the relaxing presence for a few moments before his memory began to come back to him. 

He quickly sat up, brushing past the woman’s expanse of pale blond hair. He’s met with a wave of vertigo but manages to maintain his barings. He stayed still, willing it to go away.

It did not. Adam suppressed the urge to vomit as the woman gently rested a hand on his shoulder.

“Relax please,” the woman’s voice is quiet but soothing.

Despite his mind repelling his body betrays him. He is so exhausted. He relaxes into the woman’s touch.

“I don’t need your help,” Adam croaks out.

“Oh, sweet child. Sometimes it’s okay to ask for help.” She stroked his hair, very gently, a feather like touch.

“Let’s get you cleaned up. Come on now.”

She helped Adam to his feet as Adam fought off the vertigo. She looped an arm around him and helped him walk. It’s a short walk to the woman’s house, a quaint little place painted blue. The woman led him inside, all around feminine faces peered at him but Adam was too tired to think about them.

He is led to a bed and allowed to collapse into it. It felt so much softer than his old bed and Adam is out in moments. 

***

Adam was woken by a cold washcloth on his face, gently washing away the dirt and blood. He opened his eyes to a young woman about his age leaning over him. She had brown skin and choppy hair.

Adam sat bolt upright.

“How long have I been asleep?” he tried to squash any panic out of his voice when he spoke.

He couldn’t afford to miss work. What would happen when his father found out-

His father.

Adam begins to remember what happened to him.

“About 18 hours. You’ve been sleeping since Persephone brought you here. She found you collapsed outside of the forest,” the girl explained.

18 hours. He has missed an entire day of work. He didn’t know the implications of that anymore. 

“We tried to fix you up,” the girl continues, “you were bleeding out your ear. We couldn’t figure out how to help.”

Adam reached up to touch his ear. It didn’t feel like anything was different. Experimentally, he snapped his fingers. He heard nothing. He tried again, and then the other side. 

He could not hear out of his left ear. He was deaf.

“I’m so sorry,” it’s all Adam can say, “I’ll leave now.”

“No!” the young woman says, “Don’t go anywhere. At least let us feed you.”

She stands and swiftly exits the room, leaving Adam alone.

He feels foggy and disoriented. He sits back on the bed as his emotions begin to come back to him. He is quickly overwhelmed. He truly has nothing now. Not a penny to his name, not a house to come home to. He wasn’t even sure if he had a job anymore, and now he was taking advantage of these people’s kindness.

“Are you doing okay?”

Adam was surprised by the soft voice. He turned to the door to see the woman with the blonde hair.

“Yes, mam’” Adam answered. 

“Good,” she smiled at him, small and kind. 

“Persephone, move! I’m trying to feed him,” the young woman who attended to him earlier brushed through the curtain of hair, protecting a tray of food with her hand.

The young woman approached and handed him the tray. There is tea and porridge on it. Adam realizes how hungry he is but he still has no desire to eat.

“I’m Blue, by the way.”

“Adam. Thank you for the food, but I can’t accept this.”

“Please you must eat,” Persephone floated over on silent bare feet.

“I can’t impose on you,” Adam tries to explain.

Blue scoffs at him. “You’re not imposing, you’re malnourished. Eat!”

Persephone nodded.

“Okay,” Adam gave in. 

The porridge was warm and scrumptious. The tea was also warm but tasted slightly like feet. Before he knew it, the porridge was gone and most of the tea too.

“Better now?” Blue asked.

“Yes,” Adam answered truthfully.

“Good.” Blue smiled at him and Adam realized that she was rather pretty. She had warm eyes and wore a colorful patchwork dress.

She took the tray and left the room, leaving Adam alone with Persephone.

“Stay here awhile, just until you get back on your feet,” she said.

“I can’t” Adam insisted.

“Please, I insist.”

“I have no way to repay you.”

“We will work something out, I am certain,” Persephone said.

“Okay,” Adam conceded. 

He closed his eyes and went back to sleep.


	2. II

Ronan’s dreams had been getting more and more intense. They were darker and the night horrors were coming more often and faster. They were getting more and more ferocious and harder and harder to fend off. 

The light faded. No longer could he summon whimsical nonsense. He could barely exist in the forest of his dreams without the night horrors being altered to his presence.

To alleviate this Ronan began drinking more. That way he would black out and not dream. Unbeknownst to him it was only throwing him further into the pit of grief as the alcohol amplified his emotions. 

And all Ronan had was negative emotions. Grief and pain and anger. The only lights in the darkness were Gansey and Matthew. Matthew especially. Without him Ronan would have let himself succumb to the night horrors long ago. He fought on for his brother and his friend. The people he knew would miss him if he was gone.

And that night was no different.

Ronan was having a nightmare. Like almost every nightmare before it, it started in a dark and tumulus forest. It was night but no moon or stars shone overhead, the sky was solid black. Wind tossed the branches of the trees violently, the branches creaking and moaning.

Tck tck tck tck tck.

Before Ronan could even gain his bearings, the night horrors were already closing in. They came from the treetops. Black as the night, their feathers and sinew glistening. Beaks and eyes and talons and screaming and fear and fear and fear.

But Ronan had learned. He was becoming better and better at deflecting the attacks. He imagines himself outside his body, watching from a third person point of view as the monsters descend upon him.

He watched as the night horrors tore at his flesh and will himself to wake up.

Wake up.

WAKE UP

Ronan awoke to a dim room and a soft bed. Next to him a version of himself silently twitched and convulsed as it bled out. Slowly the feeling returned to his body as his double spasmed and gurgled through his death throes. 

Ronan sat up on the bed and scrubbed his hands over his shaved head.

Every night now. Every single night the night horrors come. Ronan was wearing thin. The less he slept and the more he drank the less the night horrors could come for him and it was beginning to weigh upon him heavily.

There would be no more sleep to be had that night and he had a body to dispose of. He got to work. He threw his dead body double over his shoulder and stumbled through his dead parent’s house. He walked through the fields and the slumbering cattle, retrieving a shovel from a barn, to the edge of the property where the forest began. 

Even in the dark he could navigate it with ease. He walked to a small clearing and dropped the body to the ground. He had been to this clearing many times with the same purpose. The ground was disturbed in many places from similar incidents. He found an undisturbed patch of grass and began to dig.

***

“Someone was in the fucking forest last night, Gansey,” Ronan spat out through clenched teeth.

Gansey looked up from his journal, his food ignored in favor of research. 

“The forest? What were you doing in the forest last night?” Gansey asked wide eyed and inquisitive.

“Dealing with bad dreams,” Ronan said. He took another swig of his pint of beer. 

Gansey was the only one outside of the family who knew of Ronan’s powers and they were a subject of endless fascination for him. Despite his fever for knowledge Gansey had long ago given up trying to get a full explanation out of Ronan. He knew of the night horrors and how Ronan accidentally took bad things out here and there, but he did not know the full extent of how bad they were getting.

“Someone saw you dreaming?” Gansey asked in a hushed tone to not be heard by other patrons of the pub.

“No, someone saw me burying a dream,” Ronan hissed.

“Did you see who it was?”

“Fuck no,” Ronan said with more aggression than necessary, “It was as dark as shit and they ran once I saw them. They probably thought I was burying a body.” He had been, but Gansey didn’t need to know that.

“So, they ran. What’s the problem?” Gansey asked, still not getting it.

“The problem is they saw me burying a goddam dream. This shit needs to stay a secret.”

“Ronan,” Gansey began in that fatherly tone of his that made Ronan roll his eyes on instinct, “I’m concerned. Your dreams have been getting worse.”

Ronan sat back with a huff. So, he hadn’t been as secretive as he thought. He shouldn’t be mad at Gansey though; they were like brothers. Gansey could read him better than anyone else. 

“I have been doing some research,” Gansey's face lit up when he said this, causing Ronan to groan. He didn’t want to listen to Gansey’s theories, he just wanted the nightmares to stop.

“And I think I found someone who can help,” Gansey said with a small secret smile, the giddy schoolboy he was at heart peeking through.

That set Ronan off. No way was he letting anyone else into his world, it was dangerous enough as it was. He didn’t need more people in the crossfire of his dreams, or worse, someone trying to control him. What Ronan wanted more than anything was his father to still be alive. A mentor to teach him and guide him. Not a ghost who haunted his worst nightmares, the grief of missing so powerful it threatened to crush him every night.

“No fucking way,” Ronan spat out each syllable slowly so that Gansey fully got the point. 

“Oh, please Ronan, keep an open mind,” Gansey begged. “I found these physics-”

Ronan cut him off with a scoff, “I’m not going to see any bullshit physics.”

“These are the real deal!” Gansey insisted.

“Witches, godless witches,” Ronan said. 

It was Gansey’s turn to scoff.

“Say what you will, I really think they could help you. Physics deal with this sort of stuff, it’s like their bread and butter.”

“They deal with dream monsters trying to kill them?”

“No, I meant they deal with magic. They are seers Ronan, maybe they can see things that you can’t. Things that can help you.”

“No fucking way am I going and that’s that.” 

With that Ronan downed the last of his beer and slammed the glass on the table. He aggressively stood up and stomped out of the pub.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” he demanded of his horse, Chainsaw, before saddling up. He flicked the reigns and they set off back to the Barns.

***

Alone in the pub Gansey turned his attention to the bill. Without Ronan he had no reason to hang around. He decided to go to the physics’ right away. He had nothing to lose. At the worst they were duds and took up some of his time. At the best they were the real deal and could find a way to help Ronan.

He called upon the carriage and booked passage to the physics’ residence. It was located at 300 Fox Way. It was a quaint little cottage painted a cheery shade of blue. It has a small well-tended garden of herbs and wildflowers. A sign out front advertised physics services. Gansey thanked and paid the carriage driver and proceeded up the stone walkway to the door.

He knocked on the door and it was opened by a short woman around his age. She greeted him with a scowl. Gansey looked her up and down. She was wearing the most interesting dress he had ever seen. It looks like a patchwork quilt, a carefully constructed hodgepodge of colors and patterns. She’s beautiful, despite her obvious displeasure. Gansey has to rip his gaze away from her exposed ankles. 

Gansey composed himself, projecting his formal persona, “Hello I am here for a reading,”

“MOM, YOU HAVE A CLIENT,” the girl roared over her shoulder.

A shout came from deeper in the cottage that Gansey was unable to hear. The woman rolled her eyes in response.

“Come on,” she said and turned into the house. 

Without waiting for him to follow she plunged in. The house was cozy. 

Mismatched art hung on the wall and useful objects lined the walls. The girl led Gansey down a short hallway to a dark windowless room in the center of the cottage. A round table with a velvet tablecloth sat in the middle of the room, surrounded by mismatched chairs. 

The woman motioned to the chairs and Gansey sat. She left the room. 

After a few moments he could hear shouting deeper within the house. Gansey waited patiently. After an unprofessionally long time three women entered the room along with the girl from earlier. 

One woman had a strong resemblance to the girl who opened the door, another was tall with dark skin, and the third had a mass of curling blond hair. They took their seats across from Gansey as the girl hovered at the edge of the room.

“Blue, please stay,” the woman with the large hair said in an airy voice.

The girl, Blue, huffed, but did as she was asked.

“So, you would like a reading,” The woman to the right, who looked to be Blue’s mother, asked.

“Yes, for my friend,” Gansey replied politely.

The woman to the left scoffed, “How can we do a reading for someone who is not here?”

“I did not know that was a requirement for a reading,” Gansey looked down at his hands that were clasped before him. 

Everyone else in the room found this to be a very oblivious statement.

“To do a reading, we must be able to read someone's energy. We need to connect with them,” Blue’s mother explained, “We can however do a reading on you.”

Gansey weighed his options, thumbing his lip.

“I guess I will take the reading for myself then,” he said. He didn’t know how to explain Ronan’s predicament in a way that did not violate Ronan’s privacy.

“All right then.”

Each woman produced a set of cards. One by one they passed the decks of cards to Gansey and had him shuffle them three times. He then cut each deck and drew a card. 

From Blue’s mother’s deck he drew the Page of Cups. From the deck belonging to the woman with the white hair he drew Death. From the deck belonging to the woman on the left he drew a reversed Page of Cups.

Around the table the women scowled. In the corner Blue craned her neck to see the cards.

“I think this reading might be a dud,” Blue’s mother suddenly declared. She collected her cards, stood and left the room.

“Oh,” was all Gansey could say, “How much do I owe you.”

The woman with the dark skin and Blue shared a glance.

“Twenty dollars,” the woman announced.

“Each,” Blue added.

Gansey took out his wallet and handed over sixty dollars to the woman’s waiting hand.

“About my friend,” he began, but faltered, “He’s having trouble sleeping.”

“We have teas to help one sleep,” the dark skin woman said, “I can sell you some.”

A crease formed between his eyebrows. He didn’t know how to explain, Ronan did not have trouble falling asleep.

From across the table the blonde woman’s soft voice called out, “If your friend is having magical issues, he needs a magical solution.”

Everyone in the room starred but she was unaffected.

“We should charge you extra,” the dark-skinned woman remarked.

Gansey took that as his cue to leave.


End file.
